User Guide

book.
Letters of Credit: A View of Type Design by Walter
Tracy [Boston: David Godine, 1986. 224 p, ill.] A beautiful
and profusely illustrated step-by-step demonstration of type-
design aesthetics that traces the beginnings and the path of
modern-day typesetting.
Printing Types: Their History, Forms, and Use by
Daniel Berkeley Updike (1860-1941) [New York: Dover,
1980 reprint of the second (1937) edition]. This is the
classic work in the field of typographic history. Updike was
a leader in the revival of traditional printing typefaces in the
United States, and was the founder of the Merrymount
Press (1893). A series of lectures he gave at Harvard from
1910-1917 served as the basis for Printing Types, which
was first published in 1922. This Dover reprint is in two
volumes, 618 pages of text plus 300 unnumbered
illustrations. As Dover says in the jacket notes, “Printing
Types presents the standards, the landmarks in typography
that anyone connected with printing must know. In its
mammoth, illustrated coverage, it is without a doubt the
definitive guide to the subject.”
Type and Typefaces by J. Ben Lieberman [New
Rochelle: The Myriade Press, 1978] is an alternative to the
Lawson book, but much less accurate, bigger (142 pages, 8
1/2 x 11, hardcover) and much harder to find. Lieberman
was an enthusiastic amateur printer, and this book is an
exuberant look at the history, classification, identification,
and personalities of typography. It includes examples of
over 1,000 type faces, and is well illustrated. Lieberman
was not a scholar, but if you like unabashed ‘boosterism,’
you might find this book fun to read, despite its errors of
both omission and commission.
Fine print on type; the best of Fine print magazine on
type and typography by Charles A. Bigelow, Paul
Hayden Duensing, Linnea Gentry [San Francisco: Fine
Print: Bedford Arts, 1988] is an excellent selection of
articles from Fine Print magazine, the one indispensable
periodical that anyone concerned with type should subscribe
to. Each issue is designed by a different typographer, and is
printed by letterpress. In addition to scholarly articles,
typographic overviews, reviews, and notices of new books
on typography, a supplement included with each issue
Fontographer User's Manual
D: A Short Bibliography Page #2